


Addicted to Misery - Part Two

by CFM (Catatonic)



Series: Addicted to Misery: A Love Letter to the Living Dead and Their Enablers [2]
Category: Re-Animator (1985)
Genre: Angst, Cats, Death, Dreams, Family, Gen, Mental Anguish, Pets, Wishful Thinking, loved ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-04
Updated: 2014-04-04
Packaged: 2018-01-18 03:19:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1413100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catatonic/pseuds/CFM
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan daydreams; things go severely sappy</p>
            </blockquote>





	Addicted to Misery - Part Two

These sullied fingers. Cain stared vacantly at the chest of drawers through his hands.  The bureau Megan had so often left her clothes in for a cozy weekend.  He could hear her laugh -- the soft cackle as Rufus would be sure and interrupt their climax.  Dan's mind touched the silky, new, raven-slick fur that he felt when he first met Rufus; the lick he received that ultimately ended in signing many, lined, papers.  That little black hair-ball had a gumption all his own.  Dan's mind touched the rigid, gummy pelt as Rufus lay there, screaming at the top of his abandoned lungs. . .perhaps wishing behind those dimmed eyes that he had never been born. That Daniel had betrayed him.

Cain tried to channel his anger towards a flicker of Herbert West, that maniac he was so long accomplice to. But in that same instant he saw West's expression, as doctor Hill's laser-drill descended upon his temple. And he knew West was just as vulnerable as himself. Maybe more.  West was presumably deceased.  "I might not ever fully forgive him for getting me into this," thought Cain, "but I sure as hell won't wish ill against a dead man." Cain laughed bitterly. "West helped me discover things about myself I wouldn't have otherwise known."  Not all of those things were bad; not all them good.

This evening wasn't the first time Daniel Cain had considered moving away from Darkmore Street.  This pain was unbearable.  Suicide wasn't an option -- Not after the the fatality count he had a hand in; what seemed like a separate lifetime.  His shoulders were bruised. His eyelids stayed purple.  That could all be cleaned up. Healed. His heart, his integrity, could not be.  He let loose a whimper and his jaw clicked open and closed, again and again.  He curled into a muscular ball on the bed.  When he was at home, alone, he usually wore the bloodied under-shirt to remind himself. To make certain _it_ would never happen again.  Megan; he missed her. He missed his kitty and he missed Meg's father.  He also missed Herbert West.  He recalled the four and one-half years ago, his first week at Miskatonic, the coffee and Mace's radio, from which Stevie Wonder seemed to shove him into Megan's path, deliberately.  He thought of heaven. For some reason he liked the idea that Herbert West had given up real science and was only a humble mineral farmer for the skies.  Dan shut his eyes for a moment. He shuddered at the alternative.

He dragged himself to the kitchen and poured a glass of month-old milk. To take his regimen pills. They were large and white and stuck in his throat.  The child's face on the drink carton wasn't helping his depression dissipate any quicker.  A child? Yes. He remembered a child's face from his dreams.  There were many nights when West would keep him up too long. The early nights when he'd stand around with the electric torch in hand, shaking from the cold, feeling utterly useless, and tired of his colleague's endless supply of energy.  When things looked less intense, and denial was belief.  Before the deaths.  The rain beat down on his fluffy head as he watched West's thin shoulders struggle with the shovel daubed in hardening mud.  He'd make a funny godfather, Cain thought, endeared where one corner of his mouth grinned upward.  He brought the lamp closer in.

The face. Yes. It was still fresh in his mind.  Dan hated that word: fresh.  It reminded him of West's distance; his morbid mantra for newness; of his resounding conclusion, his self-odium at experimental failure -- towards the beginning of the end -- when he told Dan that the corpse wasn't 'quite fresh enough!'

It was a boy -- No. A girl.  No, it was a little boy.  Every aspect of being lacked clarity for Cain.  Megan had always fancied the name Derek.  Dan liked Morgan.  The hopeful couple settled that if they were to have a girl, she'd be Morgan, but if it was a boy, he'd be Derek.  "What if we have both," growled Dan playfully, as he pulled her closer to his lips.  He swallowed the first of the pills; the biggest.  He saw Herbert with his tie dishevelled, relaxed, crossing his leg in the booth as he swirled the ice around in his glass, chatting with Megan, superficially content, waiting for Alan to bring the kids.  Dan was in line for shakes.  Tommy Edwards made the line more bearable.  The kids go flying towards Herbert, calling him "Uncle Herbie", and he greets them with smiles as kindly as he can feign.  Alan steps Dan aside, Meg takes the tray of milk shakes from Dan.  She can see on his face that it must be something to do with patient losses.  Dan swallows the second pill; its bitter.  Morgan begins to bat at the record plaque above Herbert's head. She scaled his figure without him noticing. Dan's face grows brighter, the moment taking his mind off the finality of what Alan has told him -- Its all an equal part of life, he reminds himself optimistically.  The record swings and West mumbles angrily, but Alan spares him a wink and West simmers out.  Derek squirms from Megan's arm and kisses "Uncle Herbie" on the cheek, pressing his spectacles into tender facial skin.  Herbert blushes and adjusts his tie.  Alan pulls a chair up (he insists he won't fit in the booth). Dan guffaws.  The jukebox switches the song playing.  The dream fades away.  Cain hesitates.  He throws his head back and pops the third pill.


End file.
